New first-time homeowners and confused plumber....

lowercanada

Semi-retired builder with 45 years fixing and building under my belt. I've been helping a nice couple who've moved into a house that's back yard backs up to the side of my back yard. These are old houses….built late 1800s to early 1900s. The previous owners were, to put it mildly, ignorant, and unpleasant to boot. I saw one of the large local plumbing co.'s trucks parked up a week ago, so I asked the new neighbors what was up. They weren't exactly sure, but they had had some "spurting" at the faucets, so they called the plumber. Who told them the water heater was "installed backwards", but it wouldn't make any difference, and fixing it would mean they would have hot water coming out of the cold faucets…..

At this point my brain is doing spins. I go introduce myself to the mechanic, and sure enough, house supply is piped straight from the main to the hot side of the tank. The tank top has a nice big red marking around the hot nipple, and a matching blue for the cold. The mechanic spent two hours there, all to drain the tank, cut the supply a few inches above the inlet, install a new nipple because there was some corrosion on the old one, and press-fit the supply back together. He still hasn't come back and retrieved the utility pump he used to completely empty the tank before he did any work.

I spend a lot of time these days convinced I live in a madhouse….

But I did learn something…there are storage heaters that are fed by a tee at the drain valve. Learn something new every day.

mattmia2

usually it is more indirects and commercial style tanks that have the inlet at the bottom.

109A_5

Does the house have a hot water recirculation system ? The drain valve tapping is sometimes used for that type of system.

Tanks with the Hot and Cold reversed simply work poorly, since you are getting your hot water from the bottom of the tank via the dip tube. I have seen tanks where the dip tube can be moved to the typical Hot tapping to accommodate legacy piping.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Vaughn Electric water heaters come (or came) from the factory with a 3/4 brass tee at the bottom of the tank. CW feed and a drain valve in it.

HVACNUT

Why type of water heater? You say its being fed (cold inlet) by a tee with a drain valve at the bottom of the tank? Does it pipe straight in cold and out hot, or is it piped through a coil in a boiler?

lowercanada

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1907023#Comment_1907023

Gas fired…which I suppose I should have mentioned…and not sure why you asked any of your other questions!

lowercanada

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1907008#Comment_1907008

no re-circ

"accommodate legacy piping"…..I can -just barely- imagine a situation where that would make sense ;-)

lowercanada

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1907009#Comment_1907009

I came across the info re Tee at the drain valve type heaters while Googling the situation….the did say those were typically electric, and often for mobile homes

Steamhead

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1907033#Comment_1907033

At least some John Wood electric ones did too- my parents' house had one.

Larry Weingarten

Hi, if there's any way we could get photos and or a sketch of the piping and tank we could probably help you figure out the flow better. It sounds like an interesting/entertaining problem. 🤪

Yours, Larry